An office room of the Green Ray International, a chit fund firm, located at Jaleswar main town was gutted by a mysterious fire on Sunday. locals saw smoke billowing out of the first floor of the building at around 10.30 am and informed police and fire brigade about it.
The floor had been sealed since May last year following raids by the State Crime Branch police. Fire personnel had tough time to douse the flame as the floor was sealed. They broke the rear portion of the building to get access to the floor. It took nearly three hours to bring the fire under control.
Police said the cause of the fire was yet to be determined although locals smelt foul play in this accident. The locals said the four-storied building located a few yards from the local police station was owned by the deposit collection company.
The room in which the fire broke out was of the managing director. All the items of the room including computer hardware, paper documents and furniture were gutted.
The Green Ray International’s board members have been absconding after the raids by the Crime Branch. The four directors are Mir Sahiruddin (managing director), Khalik Saha, Ayub Saha and Mir Tahiruddin.
The company had collected a huge amount to the tune of a few hundred crores of rupees from depositors under various lucrative schemes.
The company was operating as a multilevel marketing firm having its more than 100 branches across India and abroad since its establishment in the year 2008.
Having its head office at Jaleswar, the company, in fact, was siphoning money from the ground investors through different schemes, all involving gold plans, under which the company assured the investors that 24 carat gold coins at the then market rate corresponding to their deposit value were reserved with it. Further, the company was offering interest of 2.5 per cent per month on the deposited.
The company collected about Rs 520 crore from the investors in two fiscal years, 2011-12 and 2012-13, the Crime Branch had learnt during its investigation.
As per the claim of the company, it should have nearly 272 quintals of gold reserved with it, the investigation team had further estimated.
As many as five cases were registered against the company and nearly 10 of its employees were arrested after the raids. The district police apart from sealing the company’s branch office had also verified its transactions through its chartered accountant firm.
A local said, “It is suspected that the fire was designed to destroy all evidences when raids by the CBI are in progress on other chit fund companies. The Green Ray International is also in the list of the CBI for its investigation.”